Chapter Four: Diagon Alley
"Have a nice day, Mr. Potter," the cashier exclaimed as she handed Harry three sickles- his change from buying a new set of quills. Harry tried to avoid the overexcited eyes of the cashier.
"Thank you," he mumbled, walking away. He slipped the coins deep into the pockets of his pants and he joined up with his friends. "Is it just me, or is not being recognized even more difficult than before?"
"Oh, be happy, Harry," Ginny moaned as she took Harry's hand, lacing his fingers between her own. "Your troubles are behind you, and I'm fairly certain that's worth all of the constant acknowledgment."
Harry muttered something incoherent, and his girlfriend pushed his arm.
"Get over it, Boy-Who-Never-Dies." Ginny casually lifted herself up onto the tip of her toes and kissed Harry sweetly. The two bystanders looked away from the couple. Hermione glanced away out of courtesy, and Ron looked away to save his temper from being unleashed.
"Why don't we move on to the next shop?" Hermione announced. They four students made their way out of Scribbulus Everchanging Inks and, unknowingly, into a crowd of flashing lights and cameras. Annoyed with the press, Harry, Ginny, and Hermione pushed their way through the crowd, almost stepping on a part-Goblin reporter on the way. Ron paused momentarily, flashing a smile towards the cameras before he followed his friends into Flourish and Blotts.
"Honestly, Ron," Hermione started, "I don't see why you bother posing for those idiotic reporters." Ron huffed as he pulled out his school supplies list.
"Yeah, Ron," Ginny added, "they're most likely going to post an absurd story about how you have a thing for Rita Skeeter and you were just grinning looking into the eyes of your lover."
"At least I don't look like I have something to hide like you three," Ron grumbled. Harry, not wanting to start a feud before they even set foot onto campus this year, changed the topic of conversation.
"Now, we just need to get all of our books," Harry guided the conversation. "I need books for Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Transfiguration, Herbology, and Charms for me. How about you guys?" Ron had the same, Ginny had all of the same ones plus Astronomy, and Hermione's list, in comparison, seemed never-ending. She needed Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Transfigurations, Charms, Herbology, Ancient Runes, History of Magic, Arithmancy, and Astronomy.
"I'm not helping you carry that mountain." Hermione scowled at Ron's response as she looked back down to her list. She scanned over the usual names and familiar titles until she reached an unknown. Hermione's eyes stopped and reread the name of the book and the author.
"This can't be right…" Hermione babbled. "The books have always been Standard Book of Spells by Miranda Goshawk, so this clearly must be a mistake. There isn't any reason why he would change the book unless he essentially wanted to rebuild his lesson plan-"
"Hermione," Harry interrupted, "What are you even talking about?" Hermione looked up from the parchment in her hand, confused.
"Flitwick always assigns us the same books, but this year for Charms, we need Charms for the Advanced Minds by Igor Hubuntant."
"So?" Ron jabbed. "It's not important, Hermione. Maybe this book is better."
"Ronald, this book isn't better. This book isn't what Professor Flitwick would assign us!"
"Let it go, Hermione," Harry tried to coax. "It's doesn't really matter what he decided to give us. It doesn't make that much of a difference."
As the four tried went to locate retrieve their books needed for the new school year, Hermione, though quiet about the matter, never let go the fact that the book was changed. She knew that somehow, the change was going to make a difference. If only she knew what a change it would be.
After all of the books were bought and conveniently shrunken down to a pocket size by Hermione, the group left Flourish and Blotts and split up to finish the rest of their shopping alone. Ginny and Ron went to go get new robes, which they could finally afford with a new wave of money coming in from the press and fame of the war. Harry made his way down to the other side of Diagon Alley in an attempt to purchase a new owl, but Harry couldn't bring himself to even walk into the shop. He just stood outside and thought about how he couldn't possibly try to replace his old friend. Hermione weaved in and out of the crowds, browsing the magnificent parchment and quills that she knew she didn't need.
The four, after being separated for less than an hour, met back up on the decided meeting place, Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes. Once there, the four of them peered curiously at the sign on the door.
"Out for lunch; do not enter," Ginny read from the sign. "Do you think the applies to us?" Ron reached around to the door, giving in a forceful tug. Suddenly, Ron, with a powerful scream, flew back 10 feet into the air, landing onto a small witch's street shop. She old witch hollered at Ron, who just groaned in pain.
"I told you not to enter," Harry said brokenly.
"Excuse me?" Ron steamed, trying to stand up without breaking anything else from the witch's street shop.
"The sign changed," Harry pointed out, "It now says 'I told you not to enter'."
"But weren't we going to meet Mrs. Weasley here?" Hermione asked. "What, are we just going to wait around until the twins return?" Unable to think of a better option, Harry, Ginny, and Hermione sat on the stoop before the Weasleys' shop. Ron handed over half of the money in his pocket as he flicked his wand, cleaning up the mess he made.
"Honestly George, I don't see why you need to close down the whole shop to tell me something. I'm sure it could have waited until Fred got back, or even Verity." George paced the back room of his joke shop, nervously thinking about the situation.
"Mum, I have to tell you something," George began. "And I need you to promise that you won't tell anyone about it."
"Oh Merlin, George, please don't tell me what you did. I don't what to know who or what is after you this time. George, you have to understand that laws, though sometimes may seem like it, are not school rules. You can't just break them and expect no consequences to-"
"I'm not in trouble with the law," George interrupted as he noticed relief spread throughout Mrs. Weasley's body. "I'm not in trouble with anything, for that matter. This isn't necessarily bad news, but you just can't tell anyone before I say you can. Alright?" Mrs. Weasley nodded, and George inhaled a deep breath to momentarily procrastinate. Once his mother knew, the situation was going to officially be real to George, and that was a huge step.
"Mum," George slowly began, "I'm not going to be making it to the weekly Tuesday night dinners that you want me and Fred to always come to."
"George, you are going to be malnourished if you don't come home! Who knows what you two cook for yourselves here."
"I'd come home if I could, but it really won't be possible. You see, I have this new job-"
"What about the shop?" Mrs. Weasley interrupted. "You boys dropped out of school to own this joke shop, and now you both just decide you want to leave the business-"
"Not Fred, Mum," George correct his mother. "Fred isn't leaving the shop, just me. And before you say anything else, it's not because I want to. It's more like a duty I have. And I'll come back, I swear! I'll just be gone for a year."
"You're leaving Fred? I don't believe it..."
"Neither can I," George sighed to himself. "But Dumbledore was really persistent-"
"Dumbledore? You're doing this for Dumbledore?"
"Yeah, I am. He came up to me at Harry's party and asked me to do it, and since I didn't really have much of a choice, I said yes. He said it would be somewhat of a final mission to the Order to take this job."
"Where is he sending you?" George noted the small hint of worry coming from his mother's mouth.
"Not anywhere extreme, Mum. Just to Hogwarts for the year. I don't really know how to say this, but you're looking at the new Charms teacher for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry." George looked into his mother's eyes. He couldn't tell what emotion was more prominent: doubt, pride, or curiosity. George waited for Mrs. Weasley to respond as she processed what he said again and again, making sure she heard him correctly the first time.
"You're going to be a professor at Hogwarts?" George nodded. A grin swelled up on Mrs. Weasley's face as she jumped up from her seat and engulfed her son in a bone-crunching squeeze.
"My baby, a professor at Hogwarts!" she hollered with bliss. "I always hoped one of you would, but I never thought it would be you to do it!" George ignored the backhanded compliment as he pushed himself away from the hug, enabling himself to breathe.
"So that's why I might not see you so much this year."
"Oh, that's alright with me! Miss all of the dinners for the next decade and it will be okay! You're a professor! I could tell the world!"
"But you can't," George reminded her. "Nobody can know about this until after the first day back at school, especially not Ron, Ginny, Hermione, or Harry." When Mrs. Weasley asked why, George explained Dumbledore's love for the surprise of new professors. He also explained, on a more somber note, why he needed to take up the position in the first place.
"So that's why Dumbledore came to me about it at Harry's birthday party," George concluded. Mrs. Weasley then jumped up, much to George's surprise.
"I was supposed to meet the kids here an hour ago!" Mrs. Weasley exclaimed. She congratulated her son one more time before walking out of the shop to find the four kids.
"Remember not to tell them!" George called our after his mother. George sat down in a wooden chair along the side of the wall. He slumped down further and further in the chair until, suddenly, a voice snapped George right out of his seat in shock.
"So, the talk with mother dearest went swimmingly, I presume?" Fred strolled over to his brother, casually swinging the key to the shop with his hand.
"When did you get back?"
"Oh, I walked in through the back entrance just in time to hear the praise that we never got before from Mum. Was it nice, for once, to be on the Percy side of the spectrum?"
"You bloody well know I'm not Percy or anything like him," George fumed. Even if the family was on speaking terms with him now, that didn't mean that Fred an George liked him any more than before the family shunned him.
"Oh, I know you're not Percy. Percy was never a professor, and look at you now! You're about to fill the position of the very people we went against for seven years."
"I don't want to do this, Fred, anymore than you want me to. We haven't spent more than twenty-four hours apart from each other since we were born, and I'm not exactly teaching material. It isn't like I'm running off to shag some unsuspecting muggle in the Caribbean for the next year! I'm not going to enjoy this year."
"Your better of teaching anyways than in the Caribbean," Fred grinned slightly, mood turning around.
"We burn to a crisp, us Weasleys," both twins chanted at the same time.
"You'd come back with a nasty burn on your arse."
"Oh Gred, don't you think I have enough decency to be doing those sorts of private affairs indoors?"
"Not at all, Forge."
"I suppose you're right." The twins made their way to the front of the store. With a flick of Fred's wand, the front door became ajar for costumers and the sign on the door disappeared.
"By the looks of Ms. Yarttle across the street, somebody tried to get into our shop." George looked across the street to see what he brother was talking about, and he found the small witch street vendor across the street giving the two brothers a nasty look.
"It must have been Ron," the twins said at the same time.
"Only Ron would be stupid enough," Fred sighed.
"You'd think after all of these year, he'd be smart enough to think things through sometimes."
"You know what he is going to think through?" George looked to his twin brother in curiosity, longing to know the answer.
"What?"
"Well, when he sees you getting on the Hogwarts Express along with him in a week, I'm sure he's going to notice that something's up."
"I need to be at Hogwarts in a few days, so that's not going to be much of a problem."
"Oh, well he and Ginny are just going to mistake you for a git for not seeing them off for their last year."
"Mistake?" George asked. "My dear brother, I think you're confusing me for someone kind. You see, I already am a git, so they won't be mistaken one bit." Fred beamed at his brother's comment as the costumers started swarming in, havoc almost instantaneously ensuing. George, almost reading Fred' mind, walked closer to his twin brother and muttered something to him.
"You can handle this on your own, Fred. You will barely notice I'm gone half the time."
"That's likely," Fred mumbled sarcastically as he went to go show a pretty girl how their patented Daydream Charms worked.
Author's Notes: Thank you everyone who reviewed for the last chapter: Nutters4Potter, YelsaewRevol, Roxxii the Hedgehog, and especially Binka, who sent me the most in depth review I have ever received on any of my stories. You really got me thinking about the possibilities, and I'm especially glad you were thinking about them as well. I thought I knew what was going to happen in the story... but I might just change a few things around after that amazing review!
Now, for those reviewing (which I really appreciate and encourage, as it makes me want to get my chapters done quicker), answer this question for me: What length of chapters do you prefer, the longer length of this chapter or the shorter chapters before?